UT Martin Review: Relax, Everyone... // Aggieville Alleycats

[Music] hello everybody and welcome to the Aggie Bill Alley Cats podcast we're com r shine or anything in between we're here to deliver to you the Kansas State Sporting News you so love I'm Ace Edwards right alongside Conor bazor and welcome to the review of the UT Martin game and we have a lot of thoughts uh perhaps not as many negative thoughts has have been pushed out there into the world but we're also coming off of an all-time classic uh ESPN classic game in LSU USC we waited until that game was over and I do not regret that decision at all but a good game fantastic game that just happened there but before we dive into the review we do want to thank the sponsors of today's show that is Greg Arthur and Grandma thank you Grandma than you Grandma and if you want to have your name read out at the beginning of every episode and support the show please be sure to check out the official supporters link found in our podcast and Twitter bio but let's go ahead and dive straight into into the Tennessee Martin review it was a 41-6 wildcat Victory so another really really good defensive performance I think honestly it split the difference between you and I score prediction yeah we were both in the neighborhood because I think we pretty much just looked at the last few FCS games to start the year for us and said it's probably going to be around that and it was it was pretty much about where we ended up because I think I was thinking like 497 somewhere around there and you I know had I can't remember what your K State score prediction was but I know you had nine points for you team Haron and I thought there was a moment where you were actually going end up getting that like on the like like there's there was a chance there for a bit where you were going to be right on the money yeah but it wasn't meant to be I mean just sort of starting from the top level I I suppose we'll start with the more General good it was another sellout for K State so you know the environment was pretty good um so that that's always nice open the season with a sellout and of course the defense played really really well and I feeling we're going to dive into this whenever we get into game day grades a little bit more but my number one takeaway up to this point at least from Kate Twitter is that everyone really needs to eat a Snickers and just relax like this was a game against an FCS School a 19-year-old's first start in his home environment in the state he grew up where he's praised as being the hero I mean yeah they're going to be nerves there's going to be rust with how many new pieces there are as well as you know naturally someone's going to be nervous so what I took away was there was nothing that went wrong that couldn't pretty easily be fixed and honestly towards the back end it kind of was fixed for the most part but yeah I my biggest takeaway is just everyone really needs to relax the offense isn't broken Avery doesn't suck we're gonna be fine at least you can't draw the conclusion that we're not going to be based off of this game yeah I do think that there's been um maybe people a little too anxious uh to um lose their minds over this game uh the first half wasn't very good on offense uh like that's just indisputable like it was subpar and Avery had a pretty bad half for the most part uh but his second half well his third quarter really uh was much better and uh I I was pretty happy with how he played there he seemed a bit more comfortable it seemed like we uh met him in the middle a little bit at least it seems like um the design runs because I know that there's been a desire to not run him that much uh but we got him a few designed runs just to get some yards and get him comfortable and that seemed to kind of do the trick a little bit uh so he still doesn't grade out very well in this game for me but his second half was just Leaps and Bounds better uh than his first because his first was just it was kind of bad it was pretty bad uh but if you take Avery out of the equation this was a fantastic game uh pretty much up and down for almost every single position group so particularly the defense I thought was just phenomenal uh so I I don't really have many of any complaints that again you put it well most of the things that you can complain about are things that uh I think can be fixed pretty easily like there's not any I think glaring uh issues that came out of this game where I'm looking at that and saying like this is going to hold us back the entire season yeah and I will get worried if it like especially if some of the worse parts of like the game sort of persists more in toan or if it gets worse into tan but I'm not going to hit the panic button after one game and I think people that are doing that like I said they just maybe they need a trip to Cabo or something because it's it's a little it's a little much it's a little much but do you want to get into game day grades or do you have anything else to say before we get into that um just uh I'm really good environment particularly I think uh the um early stages of the game that's kind of how these season openers generally go I feel like uh just because we know it's an FCS opponent uh and there's a like things are pretty overmatched uh so I the environment was pretty good particularly to begin um dwindled off a little bit I I generally don't get too annoyed by that in FCS games like sure if it's like a big game at some point then yeah but otherwise well attended like people seemed really into it and it was great to have football season back so after tons of anticipation we're already one weekend yeah so now we'll get into game day grades where we go through every single position group including the coordinators and give them a grade from A+ to F A+ meaning they near single-handedly made one us the game or made very few mistakes F minus meaning they single-handedly lost us the game uh we didn't lose so there's no FS this week but and no one even really got close so we'll start off with the one that everyone is going to talk about and probably where the bulk of our time is going to be spent and that is with the quarterback with Avery Johnson and I guess you can rope Jacob can and take Juan Roberson into this but it's mostly Avery Johnson Avery ended up 14 of 21 153 yards two touchdowns and a pick and I will say that the pick reminded me a lot of Will's first two interceptions last year where it was a seam ball where it was the right decision it was just the wrong throw he needs to put a little more air under that ball and then it's a touchdown to DJ so to right decision in that moment was pretty encouraging and I didn't feel like his accuracy was all that bad but where I I took I I think the big issue that I had especially in the first half was he was he was kind of play he wasn't breathing basically is the best way to put it he was sort of getting caught up in the moment and he was missing reads because of it there are a few game there are a few in particular that I'm thinking of One Was Keegan Johnson coming off of a switch dig or a switch dagger concept I'd have to look at it again to figure out which one it actually was but Keegan John johs son was wide open coming out of his break and Avery just takes the check down instead which you know stuff like that it it happens on occasion but it it was kind of one of those plays that was like yeah KJ is your read here it was it was one of those situations and then there was another one where Jace was open for what would have been a touchdown on a little seam post up the middle basically like a little slice route looking trying to split the safeties and again Avery just just misses him he doesn't see him because he's you know he's trying to work himself too quickly and I think in a way that you kind of expect that those growing pains and that this is where I I sort of I you sort of have to expect this from a true sophomore in his second alltime start and his first home start there's going to be nerves the game is going to be going pretty fast for him does that mean he's bad does that mean he's cooked no it just means that he doesn't have the experience that other quarterbacks have and so I ended up giving him a C+ for the game the Jace Brown throw was really really nice and that bumped him up basically an entire Plus for me but those misreads are a little much for me to really give him anything better than that yeah I uh was much happier with the second half he looked more comfortable uh he was a little bit more decisive but yeah the uh overthinking some pretty open receivers uh and then kind of I think that throw of DJ is an overcorrection on that issue I think that uh he was to be more decisive and you know if you see an open guy make the throw and I think he sees DJ and instead of uh taking the time to U make the touch pass he just sped himself up too much so like you said some of that's an experience it's a little frustrating given just you know like how high the expectations are so like like Avery's gonna be you know he's he's kind of Be good he's kind of going to be graded on a curve unfortunately because his expectations are just through the roof I gave him a c minus uh I I won't say though that that's me like thinking that's indicative of the future because I was still pretty happy with how he played in the bowl game and uh when he played in the regular season last year uh I thought that it was encouraging um I think like we've said it a lot already but um most of his problems from this game very very fixed ible uh so I'm not super worried about Avery long term but for first game of the year this wasn't very great uh but he can he could increase his grade very easily I guess how I it yeah and that's sort of the the the most encouraging part is there there's a pretty clear path for him to get better and get better grade next week so that that's the Avery Johnson conversation and trust me there's you'll see a lot more of the Avery Johnson conversation in the next five five days from when this releases yeah but now we can move on to undoubtedly a bright spot and that is the Kate running back room DJ goes for one of the quietest 13 124s I've ever seen Joe Jackson makes an appearance seven of 48 Dylan Edwards five of 43 and a touchdown then Jimmy white Le James gets one r for 12 yards in a touchdown I have literally no complaints it's an A+ yeah A+ for me as well this is a very easy A+ DJ was fantastic in this one in a game where I thought we might uh not see as much of him uh because there were just whispers about him uh being like 90 or 95% out 100 so you think maybe they pulled off a little uh but now he ends up going for yet another 100 plus yard game uh he had a 48 yard run either the tail end of the third or very beginning of the fourth and uh was generally great Dylan Edwards only five carries but he made the most of them he got a a touchdown after that uh Jace Brown catch and had a couple of really explosive runs uh where the speed was very apparent there were a couple of those where he really was like one block or like one like Sho string tackle away from like breaking off a massive touchdown Joe Jackson looked really good and then James White got an actually pretty good touchdown run there at the end of the game H for the final scores this is a very very very easy A+ uh running backs have been very consistent over the course of the show and this is yet another example of that I think we're gonna have a really fun season in this room in particular yeah I I and you know a easy plus doesn't mean it just means we don't really have a lot to say so moving on to the receivers room jce Brown went five for 71 just barely missing a touchdown but I think it was what like two yards uh I think it was just a yard one yard short it's an evil world out there uh Trey Spy Two for 26 Android Davis one for nine and KJ one for six and it this is one that you know because of the quarterback play it does get more difficult to grade um it got so difficult to grade that I actually the Jace Brown fumble knocked it down the great in the return game but the receivers were pretty consistently getting open with one exception of Dante seus which is pretty concerning but he also was drawing O'Shea Baker a lot more than I really thought he would so you know that's that's a tough draw but all in all there weren't any really bad drops they were getting open they just weren't getting the ball and that's it's a tough it's an evil world out there so this is a very evil world that they have to get a be with to me yeah I gave him a B minus for pretty similar reasons just uh like overall kind of lack of production uh Jace uh I mean five for 71 I mean like that's on a stat line that I I'm hoping is kind of like his uh median um I'm hoping that's what he's uh getting per game I was really pleased with that and he probably should have had a few more catches as well honestly uh Trace BBY had two catches I I was very happy about that including one and time it actually mattered uh so he's already doubled his reception count from last year I was very happy with uh his reception uh then um yeah Davis Andre Davis gets a catch as well which I was not uh really expecting uh but yeah this was solid performance they had generally pretty decent uh run blocking as well I felt uh but yeah just not enough sample size really with these guys at Jaden Jackson I guess he had a a patented Jaden Jackson Jet Sweep um and he took that nine yards that was pretty effective um I'm hoping that we get a little bit more effective uh in the coming weeks because I'd like to to see a bit more production out of him cus I was a little disappointed to not really get anything out of him this week uh but we'll I I'll still kind of wait and see on that because I know that this just wasn't the best week for the passing game overall yeah next up is tight ends fullbacks and I know it broke Conor's heart a little bit that Garrett Oakley didn't register on you know as as we all predicted as we all predicted BR Lofton first touchdown of the year he goes two for 29 I again this is gonna it's one of those situations where you kind of have to grade on a curve because the passing game was just all right I ended up giving them an A minus mostly because when they were given the opportunity I.E Braden lofton's two catches they were pretty effective with it and you know they ran block pretty well as well especially wil Swanson wil Swanson had a very good game Run blocking but I I gave them an A minus yeah um I gave them an A minus as well uh it's pretty similar reasons Lofton he actually graded out the highest of anybody on PFF he got a 93.8 uh grade on pfff for this game um a lot of that I think comes from the fact that he ran two routes and both of them were receptions one of them was a touchdown the other was a hardfought first down so I think I think the uh um lack of sample size is doing some pretty heavy lifting there but still a a surprisingly good day for ma Titan I guess kind of flew under the radar for most of this offseason uh Garett Oakley um only got one target as I recall uh so would like to see him get a bit more involved Swanson was fine then we saw um will ano Andrew soner and Andrew Meer uh get some snaps late and those were all garbage time but they really all blocked well um Oakley could have been a bit better I think as a run Blocker we do know that's just not really what he's gonna be asked to do most of the time that's more will Swanson's job uh but will Swanson was really effective there so I was generally pretty happy with how the tight ends played even though uh they didn't get super involved in the past game that maybe something that unfortunately may have to get a little bit more used to this year because there's not a Ben inate in this room I'd really like to see Garett Oakley break out become that guy but it may be something where it just takes a couple games to happen yeah yeah I I think the tight ends will end up being fine I think this was just one of those situations where you know they weren't the game planned one for but probably the brightest spot on the day on the offense well sharing that title with the running backs was the offensive line this was a game that the offensive line dominated in a way that you know I expected them to be really good I did not expect them to play nearly as well as they did they blew every expectation out of the water for me kilty was doing excellent in pass protection Carver has become one of the most complete right tackles in since we've started the show which if you would have told me that in 2020 I would have called you an insane person but the interior was doing really well Sam hect you know wasn't noticeable which you know for for years the center has been noticeable and for the wrong reasons so Sam hack being unnoticeable beautiful this was an A+ performance for the offensive line and honestly if they can if they can keep this pace up I the offensive line will easily get like a wins above replacement of like four if we're using that metric yeah I gave him an A+ two uh I think particularly the pass blocking was absolutely fantastic I think this was one of the best pass blocking games of the climbing era uh period uh because pretty much every offensive lineman um I thought was uh genuinely great um as a uh pass blocker I mean throughout the entire game we only allowed uh three UM quarterback pressures um and one of those was in garbage time uh by Alex key uh so but otherwise we only gave up one quarterback hit too and that was on a long developing pass play that Carver Willis gave up which I mean even then it wasn't a full hit it was just kind of a bump but it was enough to take it something off the pass but I we're getting that deep into it so we're really nitpicking there on pass blocking I was super happy with that and run blocking was particularly effective like we saw a lot of last year the Run blocking seemed to get better as the game went on because I think uh it's a combination of our lines really well conditioned and um the rotating helps a bit uh which again I know there's mixed feelings on the rotating I have mixed feelings myself self um but that was I guess one of the main things I want to talk about with the offensive line was there was a series in the second or third quarter where uh kilty was not out there at left tackles John Pastor uh which I thought was really interesting because I did not notice that live uh but on rewatch uh there was a full series with John pastor at left tackle I don't know if it was injury related or they just didn't like something he did on the drive before uh but I thought that was super interesting uh was not something I expected from rotation so that makes me think that it was probably like a very like minor like Stinger or something like that uh but other than that I mean yeah this was really excellent um all across the board Lang gang played a lot of snaps he played a 25 uh so he was number six uh in terms of total snaps Willis Panzer and hex played um all the onea snaps kilty missed a few uh puer uh played 30 but then we saw a lot of backups to uh Drake Beckwith uh he was playing guard um for 13 snaps Michael capria I played 13 snaps as well then we sign Alex key Jackson Fulmer and John past story as well uh so saw the whole second unit of offensive line play play a pretty significant amount of snaps at this one St we got a couple of extras as well uh so all in all super super super happy with how the offensive line played this game normally we're having a slow start this was a very fast start for the offensive line so I hope we can keep that going going to next week yeah because that was that was an excellent performance and uh as a change up from the last few years we are going to keep the coordin grouped with their respective sides so this will be the grading of Conor Riley and I've have been harboring for for quite some time that I I don't think I've articulated at least outright on an episode before but Connor knows I have had for six far longer than that like eight months now uh I was not a fan of the Conor Riley hire hand in the air I hated it so I went into this game with very very very low expectations I expected it to be one of the most aggressively okay called football games that I have ever seen and I left the stadium pleasantly surprised in fact I was quite pleasantly surprised because there were things that Conor Riley and I imagine with the help of Matt Wells had implemented like the jet motion that everyone has stolen from Mike mcdanel in the NFL but also a little bit more in the running game and expanding upon that but the most important thing to me was how are the passing Concepts developing and they've developed really really well people were getting open like I said and that was something that I think was sort of lacking in the client era especially last year don't get me wrong Klein was a really good play caller last year but he wasn't the greatest in terms of scheming Guys open especially against like Zone coverages this was a very very big highlight for this game up against UT Martin now was Connor riy perfect no and I kind of wish that he started switching a little bit more to RPO to get Avery into that better Rhythm to say like okay yeah I can do this which he started doing a little bit more in the second half but that's something you need to do really early especially with a Young quarterback you need to sort of get him okay easy throw slant window slant hitch you know a little bubble screen here and there you need to get that out of the way really early but all in all for a relatively vanilla game plan that was implemented he still showed enough to me to get a B+ which I was fully ready to go into this game like giving him a c I gave him a pretty similar grade I gave him an A minus I was really happy with how he called this game uh first half was rough uh but um also I don't think much of I don't think it's hun of it was his fault because like you said guys were getting open Avery just wasn't seeing him now we can talk about uh the offensive coordinator's role in that at that point we're only speculating like how much of an issue it is with their communication where Avery isn't seeing the open guys or isn't pulling the trigger on the open guys I I have no idea I I'm not at practice so I don't know but the main dang that I give Riley is I really think Dylan Edwards needed more than 11 snaps in this game I I think that was a borderline coaching malpractice especially because with seven touches he scored twice yeah yes uh scored twice on his seven touches and he uh was averaging uh about nine yards per touch um it seems he had those two catches for 19 yards nine and a half per then five carriers for 43 yards eight and a half uh which again that average on the carries is brought down significantly because his last carry was like a one-yard touchdown run so uh up until that point he was getting like 10 yard chunks like every single time so uh I geted TJ giddens like had a great game like he averaged nine and a half yards himself like we were averaging nine yards per rush in this game so I was is absurd um a Johnson was never sacked he was only touched once the entire game so like really good uh but you know we've got weapons it's clear we know that it's clear we know that with the rotation at receiver uh Trey spy was getting the ball in his hands and he made a couple guys miss uh Jace Brown we were throwing at him a lot Keegan Johnson got open Plenty need to throw at him more we got DJ gens three catches he didn't do a lot but he's kind of a weapon in the past game that we've been utilizing so that brings me back to Dylan Edwards we know we have that weapon we just need to give him more touches I think getting him from seven if we get them like five more a game I'm pretty happy with that on average I'd say uh so and again also this was kind of a game where this is something we haven't talked about yet uh but um this was a very slow paced game courtesy of UT Martin uh they really were trying to play keep away like we only had 50 offensive snaps in this game and we only had 57 defensive snaps in this game so uh our our Pace was a little bit slower in this one I think than we got used to the last couple of years so nowhere near as many snaps we had in this game as maybe we'll see in other games going forward uh so that's another consideration to make yeah Dylan only touched the ball seven times but you know maybe if we snap it 30 more times he touches the ball four more times so because for for reference the I think if I'm remembering correctly the amount the average amount of plays run in an FBS game last year was like 140 yeah so we were short like 30 to 40 snaps yeah we were short by quite a bit there so it it it was a um a much slower paced game um and then of course we really slowed things down the second half and also the defense just played really great so I mean there weren't many snaps to be had there anyways because we kept getting stops yeah so now we can move on to the defensive side of the ball starting with the defensive line and the only thing that I can really say is King K Dent was in hell for the entirety of the time that he had the ball because the pressure was relentless it came from everywhere and it didn't really matter who was on the field because the offensive line of UT Martin was getting horribly horribly bullied and I I mean you have to say the most notable performance of the defensive line line is Toby ensi who got one and a half sacks by basically just running running in a hooked line which oh okay and then he hit by far my favorite ever K State sack Celebration by just standing there like a statue and the the GIF of Uso coming up and just cut checking him by slapping him on the back of the head will probably live on as one of my favorite just funny Kate gifts because they're like the Adrien bow will probably be like my favorite iconic moment GIF but in terms of laughter I don't think anything will ever top the I like you cut G from Uso seala to reactivate tobio San me but this is as easy as it was to give the running backs and the offensive line in A+ I gave the defensive line A+ in the second quarter so yeah I mean we were texting each other saying that Toby was gonna be defensive MVP at one point in this game which I ended up going different direction I think it's probably obvious why but uh I mean Toby was fantastic in this this may be a uniquely good matchup for him because he's simply better than everybody and he doesn't really have a lot of pass rush moves uh but he was great in this game with his had one and a half sacks he should have had two and a half uh but again him missing the tackle on that other sack um resulted in the only explosive play of the day for UT Martin and that's not a knock on Toby that's just say that's more me complimenting the defense and that the only reason UT Martin got an explosive play um that actually worked out for them uh was uh because of uh miscue on our part it wasn't anything they actually did themselves so it was a banner day for the dline just as we were hoping lots of rotation we saw a ton of guys uh play on the defensive line Brendan M I thought looked really good I think um our U um theory that him playing opposite um a lot of other pass rushers would help him um that I think that's Ring true so far he looked pretty good um Ryan Davis he played a lot PFF actually graded him as the third best pass rusher of the game uh for K State uh which I I was really happy with Ryan Davis he made some um really nice plays he had a quarterback hit a quarterback hurry um and uh he also had a really nice run stop I don't think was a tfl but it was almost a tfl it was a no gain I think then Travis Bates um I kind of really liked Travis Bates in this game it was kind of causing some problems on the inside there uh but we saw a ton of defensive line and I think we saw five nose tackles in this game we saw probably like eight or nine uh defensive ends in this one and I was pretty happy with pretty much all of them so the defensive line get a very very very easy A+ for me an emphatic A+ even yes and another emphatic A+ comes with the linebacking room I mean Dez Pernell it if you had one game like if it was just a one game season I would probably be picking picking for Desmond Pernell to be just Big 12 defensive player of the year because whoa listen we we knew Dez was good we knew Dez has been good this was another gear for him this was him activating the nitrous booster and just destroying worlds and I know yes it's an FCS school but everything that he was doing is stuff that carries over even two FBS levels Pursuit angles aggression being decent and knowing where he was at in coverage being tenacious meeting blocks I he was just doing everything right and I it amaz I I looked briefly at the PFF grades and I was floored by because I don't think that Dez was in the 90s was he no he wasn't particularly close either he um ended up with a 82 and a half uh overall still an elite grade but that's still too low yeah that's still like a Fant like I think in the 80s is pretty much Elite and like 90 plus is like you've had like one of the best games that you're ever GNA have in your entire life uh but no I I was I was shocked that he didn't get a higher grade than you did but PFF is just all over the place anyways especially on defense yeah particular at the college level too because there's so much more to do yeah but and that's not to say that you know Pernell was the only notable performance Roma looked good Roma looked like he took another step up from last year from his true freshman season Austin Moore only played the first half or at least a sparingly in the second half but in relief Rex van y looked pretty good as well who is making that move from will the Sam linebacker probably because he has ridiculously long arms and that makes him even better in coverage which I mean you you could make an argument for that being a Sam linebacker skill set I'm not a defensive coordinator Joe clander is better at his job than I could ever hope to be so I'm GNA choose to defer to him on that but very very easy A+ for the linebackers yeah I was super happy with them as well Desmond Perell uh that was one of the I think best individual defensive performances I've seen um since the show started uh he was flying all over the field at a um gear that nobody else was what impressed me most about him I think was how quickly he was diagnosing everything that UT Martin was doing um and I think that comes with a combination of knowing your opponent and being comfortable um in the defensive scheme and I think that allows him to just play so much faster and so more freely which that's a lot of that is an experienced thing but also a lot of it's just that's that Dez Pernell is a really good football player uh that is somehow yet another hit on the U moving safeties to linebackers uh um pipeline for K State I think there's only been one miss there um but I was really happy with Pernell Rex fan why he actually was graded out higher on PFF than does Pernell he got 84.5 and his run defense grade was 89.4 so pushing that 90 range uh but the linebackers were just excellent in this game in fact the highest graded player in this game was a linebacker it was not Dez Perell or Rex fan Wyatt I me have you looked at the BFF grades if you haven't that's great because I want you to guess I looked briefly um but I looked like I said I looked very briefly but so it isn't de yeah sorry repeat you cut out oh sorry um so it's neither van y nor Dez correct I'm guessing it's not more no it's not more is it Bo no it is not it is Gavin Meyers who played six total snaps and got an 85.9 uh defensive grade so uh word yeah yeah gav Myers the uh uh former nearly scholarship ad for Nebraska turned K State walk gun uh highest graded guy on defense but I I just thought that was interesting I wanted to share but Bo Palmer was also greated really highly remain too I mean there really wasn't a linebacker I can say that played that I was like truly dissatisfied with if there was that it wasn't someone that played enough to really like warrant like d yeah uh linebackers across the board fantastic uh and this one Moreno um I'm wondering uh What uh his return will mean because it's sounding like it was injury that held him out of this one because he wasn't dressed uh for the game so nether was ASA yeah ASA was not either so that's linebacker room was fantastic and that was at not a full strength uh so like like rexan y like that's a third level guy maybe second level guy uh how about uh cam Salis coming in and getting a a huge sack uh he wasn't even on the uh I think he was like the third string or not even on the depth chart I don't think he was on the two deep yeah so he um steps up uh with some injuries in front of him and comes up with a a splash play in garbage time so the linebackers right now are playing uh on fire so easy plus here yeah now moving into the defensive backs this is the only room in the defense spoilers that isn't going to get an A+ for me now you may be asking yourself why they only got 98 yards passing uh the main reason why is that because it probably should have been about 150 yards passing mostly because of two really really bad busts and coverage that other teams would have taken advantage of and UT Martin very nearly did take advantage of after a very very rare drop by Devonte tanksley bailing them out um and you know it's early season it's communication errors that stuff happens but I'm also very very scarred by the MU game in the beginning of that so is this a bias just a yes but again it's one of those where I don't think it's anything fundamentally wrong because you could see on both plays it was seagull and Riley talking to one another I think it was both plays it was like hey this is the tradeoff here and the other one was like yeah okay yeah I got you that's on me but for what actually happened it's probably worth an A+ but for what should have probably happened that's where it knocks it down to a I seriously toyed with not giving them an A+ I did uh but I I was pretty tempted to give them an a as well um I had I almost did right up until we start the show I changed it uh the main reason was that even though seagull and Riley um and particularly Riley did have some issues and coverage there uh Riley was still really good in run support as was Maris seagull uh uh they really really impressed with them um then we saw a lot of Corners in this game too um Jacob Parish made a huge uh run defense stop or p a stop on a screen I think it was was he was the only guy home and uh it would have been a first down but he um was able to get through everybody make a huge tackle in space uh so I was really happy with that um Garber um he uh got targeted three times only gave up one catch according to PFF um and we saw a ton of Corners we saw some Jordan Dunbar as well uh he wears number 34 uh which is kind of a a weird number for a corner I feel like but he now I know who that is because I was very confused my side for the first time I was like is that just some random walk- on or something but just some guy and Donovan McIntosh he uh played a handful of H snaps um outside of garbage time as well uh so that was pretty good to see and Justice James he was playing pretty regularly as well fabus was good Wesley Fair uh my life uh really the only major issue was uh those tradeoffs and the communication between Riley and seagull BJ Payne uh was um kind of um unnoticeable in this game uh he only got targeted once and it was a six-yard uh reception so oh well um only had one tackle on this one so I can't remember much what he did uh he wasn't super noticeable on the rewatch the other two starters were a little bit more noticeable for bad reasons so I'm going to take that from BJ uh but still I mean they were a whole defensive backfield seemed to be tackling really really well so as since I was a little harder on other positions in this one as he a sweet treat to the defensive backs I decided to let them keep their A+ even though I think it would have been totally fair to give them an A or an A minus in this one I'm just being very nice to them because I I feel like they earned because I like them yeah that's fair I'm not going to argue with that The Vibes based A+ that's good pretty much um again really easy A+ for the defensive coordinator Kerman gets an A+ that's it yeah I we got 20 pressures in this game uh Tobi oami got six pressures on his own uh in 16s I think is what it was uh so oh and yeah that's six pressures in 10 pass rush Reps for tobio andami which 60% pressure rate which is a little nuts so he he definitely should have gotten more sacks than he did not to not trying to complain or or sound like I'm uh I'm like not grateful or something for for tobio insomni here uh but yeah one rate of 50% uh pretty good I have to say so I'm I'm I'm pretty happy uh with how pretty much the entire defense played and those issues on the back end cler's the safeties coach as well as DC and kimman is the head coach uh and he was a safety in college or defensive backs coach for a long time so we'll be just fine on the back end yeah I'm not worried no so I I now we can go into offensive and defensive MVPs before we go into final thoughts to me um do you want to go first for picking your offensive or defensive MVP um I'll go ahead and pick offense first okay so go ahead I'm rolling with DJ um I I think that this was a I think honestly it wouldn't really mattered which one I went first on because I think there's two obvious picks this week but I'm roll with DJ for offense we already talked about him so yeah as tempting as it is to give it to the entire offensive line I am probably going to give it to Dylan Edwards just with how much he did with his with so few opportunities though like like the objective of the correct answer is the offensive line but in terms of defensive MVP I feel like you and I are going to come to a consensus here because although tobios s Sami did have a ridiculous week there there was there is another and that is Dez Perell with probably the best defensive performance that you and I have seen since the Felix six sack game yeah I I think you're right there um I I'm super super super happy uh with how Dez Pernell played um well exceeded my already high expectations for him uh so extraordinarily easy MVP for Des prell when for a while it seemed like tobio suami was going to run away with it uh but Dez Pernell was just so good throughout the whole game yeah plus he was on the field more so I mean basically cheating it's basically cheating accuracy by volume of fire but so now we can get into our our more General takeaways which you know we talked a little bit about during each of uh the game day grade segment but I walked away very pleasantly surprised with Riley everything else except for Avery pretty much met my expectations and anytime that Avery didn't meet expectations I just thought to myself okay this is his second start of his career no we're not counting him in Wildcat up against TCU that doesn't count but I it's all correctable and it's all stuff that's I don't want to say easily corrected but it's not like you have to completely rework his throwing motion or completely rework how he's going through his progressions it it's just small stuff and waiting for the game to slow down for him so my number one takeaway is the takeaway I opened the the entire show with is people need to relax a lot yeah um it's a great takeaway um my main one is I think this team is pretty much exactly what the coaches told us it would be if you read between the lines uh throughout uh fall Camp uh there was a ton of talk about how the offense was really great uh but it was the defense that uh was truly special and the Rumblings were always that the defense was going to really be the uh uh this was like like in contention for one of the best defenses in climbing's time here maybe the best and I think that really Rings true after one game uh we'll see if that remains true uh in regards to right now the separation between the defense and offense but offense has the tools to catch up they may not have the experience to do so uh but the pieces are there um and all in all I'm I'm not really dismayed by this game at all I'm really looking forward to continuing this season and I'm excited for the next game yeah and you know PE maybe it's just the immediately afterwards the game panicking but that's pretty much all I have in terms of of thoughts so do you have any you want to double up before we we sign off here I've got nothing else man all right well we will talk to you all then with the two-lane preview but for now thank you all for listening to this episode of the agyo alats podcast if you want to follow or contact the show you can follow us just about anywhere at aille aats and if you want to email us we're aille alicats gmail.com if you want to follow us on more personal though I Am AC Edward I am Conor bazor Capital C capital B and if you want to support the show financially please be sure to check out the official agiv Ville alleycats merch store or supporters link both in our podcasts and Twitter bios but most importantly thank you all for listening to this episode of the ago alicats podcast We Come Rain shy and anything in between we're here in liiver to you the Kansas State Sporting News you so love stay safe Aly cats